Sunday, 15 March 2015

16 March 2015

Medicinal
cannabis was a hot topic at the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs meeting in
Vienna last week.

Lest there be any
doubt, the debate centred around some of the properties of the cannabis plant
and their potential efficacy. No-one was suggesting that just smoking the
cannabis leaf was some sort of medicinal panacea!

That highlights
an important distinction in this debate – there are genuine situations to be
considered, and there are those who just want to smoke cannabis whenever they
choose to. That latter group is not our concern.

However, the
argument for medicinal cannabis is by no means a simple one. The evidence –
worldwide – is not as clear as it could be, nor is there any sense of
commonality when it comes to the issues of dosage, methods of administration,
product standards and so on.

In New Zealand’s
case, estimates of the numbers of patients likely to benefit from medicinal cannabis
are very low, which is why pharmaceutical companies have no interest in
trialling products here. At the same time, for some reason, doctors are loathe
to use the existing legal provisions to recommend patients to be prescribed medicinal
cannabis products like Sativex.

I recently asked
the Ministry of Health to review the issues relating to medicinal cannabis. The
evidence provided was, as I said in Vienna, quite underwhelming. So I took the
opportunity there to discuss with both the United States Federal Director of
Drug Policy and Australia’s Assistant Health Minister work being done in both
countries in the area of clinical trials. In both cases, the response was
similar: it is simply too early to draw definitive conclusions.

When it comes to
approving new medicines, New Zealand has always adopted a rigorous, clinical
trials, evidence based approach, and it will be no different with the medicinal
cannabis issue. We will gather the reputable evidence, consult widely with
other countries, and then take a decision based on the highest professional and
clinical standards. That is exactly the way we would deal with any other new
medicine becoming available, and there is no credible reason or justification
for treating medicinal cannabis products in any way differently. Indeed, we
would be failing the public if we did otherwise, and exposed people to
unnecessary or even unknown risks as a consequence.

This is not to
suggest in any way a change in New Zealand’s current stance on leaf cannabis
and its possession. But the issue of medicinal cannabis is a highly specific
and particular one we need to address in the light of new and emerging evidence,
as we receive it. We will do so against the three pillars of compassion, proportion
and innovation I outlined in Vienna, pillars which I hope will more broadly inform
debate about the future direction of drug policy.

Of course, that
will not satisfy those whose sole interest, dressed up in the false guise of
concern for those who might benefit from medicinal cannabis, is using cannabis
recreationally. But it will ensure over time that, consistent with the
principles of our national medicines strategy I introduced in 2007, New
Zealanders get access to new medicines that are safe, affordable and effective.

Are you going to ban me from this page to? Answer my questions Peter?1. Why is it that your willing to let untested/imported, unknown synthetic versions of cannabis to be sold in retail outlets? (we all know this stuff is 100x worse than the real thing)2. After your 'temporary ban' of synthetic sales what actions did you take to insure customs etc had the proper testing equipment to screen new chemicals?3. What research have you found to say that real cannabis if more harmful than alcohol?